


The Rhythm Changes

by alwaysbewhelmed



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Romance, University, catradora
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-05
Updated: 2020-10-07
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:47:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 16,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26290606
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alwaysbewhelmed/pseuds/alwaysbewhelmed
Summary: A Catradora University FicAdora moves to Bright Moon University for her master’s in social work. At the insistence of her academic advisor, she reluctantly attends a postgrad society social at a local jazz bar with her housemates, Glimmer and Bow, where she is shocked to see a face from her past playing piano in the house band. Will the two women be able to reconnect after so long spent apart, while confronting their past differences and shared trauma?
Relationships: Adora/Catra (She-Ra)
Comments: 15
Kudos: 97





	1. Welcome to Bright Moon University

**Author's Note:**

> Thought I'd give this a crack. Sorry if you have a hard time with all the UK vernacular, but I didn't want to embarrass myself trying to sound American. I've got all sorts of plans for this fic, but updates are likely to be slow due to the amount of coursework I currently have going. Hope you enjoy.

**Adora**

_Thump. Thump. THUMP._

The banging from next door woke Adora up with a start. She groaned inwardly and rolled over to check the time on her crappy old blackberry. 7:04AM. Apparently Bob and Carol fucking loudly in the next room had done a better job at waking her up than her pathetic excuse for an alarm. Adora sat up and rubbed her eyes. She felt seriously rough, but a lumpy single bed, draughty windows in October and an overwhelming smell of damp will do that to a person. The tired, grumpy 23-year-old was just putting her feet on the frayed grey carpet when she heard Bob’s horrid grunting start to come through the paper-thin wall. She had to get out of there.

Adora Kahane had moved to Bright Moon from London two weeks ago to start a master’s degree in social work at Bright Moon University. She had fully intended to find a room for rent in a flat or a house with other students before the start of the semester, but she hadn’t found a single place that was affordable enough for her. She was living off a loan from the government (most of which was going towards tuition) and a scholarship from the university that would cover rent and groceries so long as the rent was cheap. So, lucky Adora had no other option but to rent a room in a seriously run-down motel an hour away from the University by bus. She’d met Bob and Carol on her first day there. The gross middle-aged couple were arguing outside their room and had stopped to ask if she wanted to have a threesome with them as she was hurriedly unlocking her door. Adora shuddered at the memory.

As she pulled on a white t-shirt, maroon hoodie and jeans, Adora mentally scolded herself for not looking hard enough for a proper place to live. She was supposed to be sorted by the start of the semester – today. At this point she’d be willing to move in anywhere as long as it was far, _far_ away from Bob, Carol and their gross sexual exploits. As she opened the door out into the empty corridor, the photo on the bedside table caught Adora’s eye. Razz. Adora’s heart sank a little. Her late adopted mum would have cried if she saw Adora’s living situation – she always just wanted the best for her.

“No,” Adora whispered to herself, “she would have been proud of me for trying to make something of myself.”

Today Adora was due to meet her new academic advisor, Professor Angella Colins, and make her first steps to becoming a real social worker and making a difference. She wasn’t going to let her dismal living situation ruin that for her.  
  


***

  
“Well Adora,” Angella looked up from her laptop and peered over her glasses to look at her new student, “as I told you in my last email, your personal statement is very impressive, and moving.”

Adora looked at her feet. She knew where this was going.

“I am a little worried that your own history in the public childcare system might make the practical side of social work difficult for you.”

Adora held her breath, waiting for Angella to tell her she’d have to leave the program before she’d even started. This was _not_ what she’d planned to do today. Scenario upon scenario began to run through her head of all the depressing situations she could find herself in if she had to leave this program. It wasn’t like a politics BA qualified her to do anything more than working in a bar these days.

“If you’re going to get through this year, you’re going to need a support system.”

Adora’s head snapped up to look at her advisor who was sporting a kindly, concerned look on her face. Maybe she wasn’t being rejected after all.

“Do you have any friends here? What’s your living situation like?”

Oh. This is where the other shoe was about to drop.

“Um,” Adora started nervously. She considered lying, but Razz definitely wouldn’t have approved of that and she definitely didn’t want to start her relationship with her advisor on false terms, “I don’t know anybody here, and I’m staying in a motel on the edge of town.”

“I see,” Angella’s concerned look deepened.

“To be honest professor,” Adora continued, “it’s pretty grim.”

The professor took a long pause.

“This is a little unorthodox, Adora, but I’m going to give you my daughter, Glimmer’s phone number. She’s a medical student here and she lives in a flat I bought near the university. Her and her friend Bow are looking for a new flatmate to help pay their bills and I think you should call her. You wouldn’t have to pay any rent, just contribute to the bills and you’re going to need people to lean on if you’re going to make it through this program. Will you do that for me? I know this might seem weird, and maybe a little overbearing.”

Adora could feel tears prickling at her tired eyes. Nobody had done anything kind like this for her, certainly not since Razz passed.

“Are you okay my dear?” Adora realised she’d been sitting in silence for a while. Angella’s hand was still outstretched in front of her, holding out a piece of paper with her daughter’s phone number scrawled on it.

“Yes, thank you so much, professor,” Adora croaked through her tears, “I won’t let you down. I promise!”

“I’m certain of it, Adora. And please, call me Angella.”  
  


***

  
The call with Glimmer was a surreal experience. Not wanting to squander Angella’s incredibly generous offer, Adora had called the girl as soon as she’d walked out of the social work department building. She figured the over-the-phone introduction had gone well because she was making her way to the flat within minutes of hanging up, but the call itself was such a whirlwind conversation that Adora felt like she had whiplash.

_“Hello?”_

_A surprisingly upbeat and eager voice answered quicker than Adora had expected._

_“Hi, is this Glimmer Colins? My name is Adora Kahane, your mum gave me this numb-”_

_“Uggggggghhhhhhhhhh,” Glimmer was clearly annoyed already. Adora wondered what she had done wrong to anger the girl, “I wish she would stop trying to run my freaking life, I mean serio- wait…” she trailed off and Adora found herself holding her breath again, “Did you say your name was_ Adora _?”_

_“Yes?” Adora responded hesitantly, internally cringing at her lack of confidence in confirming her own name._

_“Okay, two things,” Glimmer shot back, her annoyance clearly forgotten in a rush of newfound excitement,_ “ _First, that name is freaking_ cute _! And second, my mum texted earlier that you were new in town and were looking for somewhere to live.”_

_Adora was confused. How quickly after she left the office must have Angella texted her daughter if she’d had time to read the message before Adora called? Or had she guessed Adora’s living situation before they’d even met? Either way this was weird, but what the hell, she needed a place to stay that wasn’t plagued by gross, old people sex noises._

_“Um… thanks, I guess,” Adora tried (although she suspected she hadn’t succeeded) to sound upbeat, “Yeah that’s right. She said you might be looking for a new roommate.”_

_“We are! That is, my best friend Bow and I,” Adora could practically hear the sparkles and rainbows pouring out of this girl, “It’s been kinda hard finding someone actually. Nobody wants to live with the professor’s kid.”_

_“Well, your mum seems super nice, so if you’re anything like her then that seems like a bonus to me.” This was genuine. Adora was really touched by Angella’s offer and if Glimmer was half as nice as her mum then maybe she had a shot at making a friend here after all… although Adora did not want to get ahead of herself on that front. Hoping for a half decent roommate was about as optimistic as she was going to allow herself to get for the time being._

_“Awwww,” Glimmer sounded genuinely moved by Adora’s compliment, “Well I’m excited to meet you already, and so is Bow, aren’t you Bow?!”_

_“Yeah!! Best friend squad for the win!!” Came a muffled shout from someone else on Glimmer’s end of the call. Adora assumed this must have been Bow, but she was more concerned with his shout of “best friend squad”. Who were these ceaselessly excitable people? What the fuck was she walking into?_

_“You can come over and see the flat now if you’re free,” this was Glimmer again, “I’ll text you the address.”_

_“Um, okay,” Adora responded quietly, “yeah, I can come now.”_

_“Awesome, see you soon.” Glimmer squealed and immediately hung up._

And that was how Adora found herself trudging through the windy streets of Bright Moon, looking for what might be her new home, terrified about the onslaught of aggressive niceness that awaited her inside.

The building itself was pretty non-descript. It was a regular British high-rise made from rather unflattering yellow bricks, but the name was pretty intriguing – _Whispering Woods Apartments_. Adora took a moment to steady herself. She’d never been particularly good at making friends, not since Razz took her in at 16 and she had to leave her school behind. That’s not to say that Horde Military Academy was a nice place for an orphaned teenager to grow up. In fact, it was pretty damn traumatic. Adora had always been a good student so she got by okay, but her closest friends weren’t nearly as lucky. She spent years watching Sgt. Weaver and the headmaster Colonel Hordak emotionally abusing her friends, and not doing a single thing about it for fear of bringing their wrath down on herself.

The school was horrible, but Adora and her friends (one friend in particular) were bonded through their suffering. She thought they’d be close forever, but all that changed when Razz came along with the promise of a better life. Horde Military Academy had a strict policy against outside communication for its residents, and Adora was never able to contact any of them again. She wondered sometimes whether she’d ever be able to make friends again without going through something horrible with new people first. It’s honestly why she thought she’d make a good social worker – shared trauma felt like the only way she knew how to connect with people.

Glimmer and Bow seemed incredibly nice over the phone, but it wasn’t hard to imagine a scenario where they’d get tired of trying and failing to connect with her, and she’d be stuck in a flat with two people who couldn’t stand her. Adora could feel herself starting to spiral. Suddenly there were a bunch of increasingly terrifying scenarios running through her brain, and she couldn’t make them stop. She was just about to turn around and walk away entirely when her piece of shit blackberry started buzzing in her pocket.

Adora pulled out the phone and answered the call.

“Hey Adora, it’s Glimmer. Is that you, standing outside our block?”

Adora took a deep breath, trying to slow her heartrate back to normal, and looked up. Poking out of the third story window above her was a mop of sparkly purple hair, which Adora surmised must have been Glimmer.

“Yeah,” Adora breathed slowly, “it’s me.”  
  


***

  
Adora savoured every second of her lift ride up to the third floor. The amount of affection thrown her way in the few short hours since leaving the motel was already overwhelming. It wasn’t that Adora had no experience with people showing her love and kindness, she had just learned never to expect it.

“This is a new start,” Adora took a moment to remind herself, “you don’t have to shut everyone out here.”

The lift lurched to a stop and Adora felt her stomach drop as the doors began to open with a ding. She had expected to have time to herself during the walk down the corridor to the flat but there, waiting for her on the other side of the lift doors, were two twentysomethings with brightly coloured clothes and even brighter smiles.

“Glimmer and Bow?” Adora asked hesitantly as she stepped out of the lift, and before she knew it, she was being enveloped in a tight hug from the two relative strangers. Without warning, Adora felt tears rolling down her face, and all of a sudden, she was racked with sobs. Bow and Glimmer slowly released her from their grip and took a cautious step backwards. Adora was sure that if she looked up at them she’d see looks of horror or disgust on their faces, but when she slowly lifted her head she was surprised to see the same look of kindly concern that Angella had given her earlier.

“I’m sorry,” Bow started. Adora noticed that the young man, sporting a bright pink crop top and short shorts (in October!), had an American accent. _That explains a lot_ , she thought to herself. “Did we cross a boundary?” He sounded genuinely worried.

“N-no,” Adora managed to squeeze the word out through her sobs. She slowly straightened her back, bracing herself against the wall with her arm. She took a long, heavy breath. “It’s just been a long time since I’ve been hugged like that.”


	2. Ya like jazz?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whelp, if I'm writing this, I'm not writing my dissertation. Two chapters in one day might be pushing it, but I really enjoyed writing this one.

**Adora**

Glimmer and Bow took a long look at one another. It had been about a minute of silence and heavy breathing for Adora who was still propped up against the wall, and now that her sobbing had subsided, she was watching the two oddly shiny people in front of her intently, wondering what they would do next. After their prolonged moment of held eye contact in which they seemed to be communicating telepathically, Glimmer nodded and the two of them launched themselves at Adora for a second time.

“You’d better get used to this,” Glimmer said softly as she wrapped her arms around Adora’s waist and held on tightly, “because you seem really nice and we’re very big on hugging.”

As Bow put his arms around the two women, Adora allowed herself to start crying again. When she said that she’d not been hugged for a long time, she meant it. Razz was the last person to give her a hug that meant anything, and she’d passed away nearly two years before Adora’s move to Bright Moon. As an undergraduate who’d lost her birth parents, her closest friends, and now her adopted guardian, Adora spent the better part of two years almost religiously avoiding physical contact with others and pushing away anyone who tried to get close to her. She had resolved, before moving to Bright Moon, that she would start letting other people make their way into her life, but she hadn’t expected anyone to try – certainly not this quickly. She could already tell that Glimmer and Bow were going to be _a lot_ , but there was no way that she was going to rebuff their friendship because they weren’t as withdrawn as she was. Maybe they’d even be a good influence.

“Let’s skip all the formal stuff,” Bow exclaimed excitedly as he and Glimmer finally detached themselves from Adora’s hoodie (which was now thoroughly tear-stained), “you’re gonna want to look around your new home!”

“Wait,” Adora was confused, “you don’t want to ask me anything about myself? You’re just happy for me to move in? I could be an awful person for all you know.”

“Oh it’s totally fine!” Glimmer was beaming with excitement, “Mum said you might need some people here, and like I said, you seem super nice.”

“Oh,” Adora could feel her cheeks getting red, “well as long as you’re sure-”

“Seriously, we’re excited to have you!” Glimmer cut her off, “Plus, as long as you’re not a habitual arsonist then you’re a serious improvement on our last flatmate.”

Adora made a mental note to ask about _that_ later.

“Well, in that case, I’d love to see the place. Thank you!”  
  


***  
  


Adora was on board as soon as she walked through the front door of Glimmer and Bow’s flat. Like them, it was pretty garishly coloured but the combined kitchen/living room that greeted her upon entering was spacious and inviting. Adora was particularly enamoured with the decked-out kitchen. Razz had spent a lot of her time teaching Adora how to bake, and it had been a long while since she had the facilities to do any baking, let alone anyone to bake for. The living room was full of piled up, multi-coloured cushions and blankets and the entire back wall was covered, floor to ceiling, with pictures of Bow, Glimmer and people who Adora assumed were their friends and family.

“Bruchim haba’im!” Bow exclaimed as the door shut behind them.

Surprised, Adora gave him a wide-eyed look.

“I saw your star of David when we hugged outside,” he said quickly, still smiling but clearly a little embarrassed at his outburst. Adora looked down and saw that she was indeed wearing her magen David. She’d completely forgotten she had it on.

“I used to help my dads run their library of historical manuscripts back in the states,” Bow explained, “so it was helpful to learn a little Hebrew.”

Adora smiled warmly. It was rare that anyone paid enough attention to her to notice that she was Jewish, and when they did, she mostly got comments like ‘you don’t look Jewish’ and ‘but you’re tall and blonde’. Adora had not been born Jewish, although Razz liked to say that she was ‘born to be Jewish’. Razz was a retired Reform rabbi, and Adora had fallen in love with Jewishness during her time living with the elderly woman. When she was 17, Razz helped her start the conversion process and two years later Adora had her Beit Din and became officially Jewish. Razz had given her the magen David that day. It was one of the only things Adora had left of her.

“That’s so cool, Bow!” Adora was genuinely excited, “Do you speak lots of languages?”

“Nah,” Bow chuckled, “I know a few phrases in some ancient languages that not very many people speak.”

“He comes from a huge family of dorks,” Glimmer stepped in and put a hand on her friend’s shoulder, “come on, let’s go see your room.”

Glimmer led Adora down a short corridor to the left of the living room. At the end were two doors, one was ajar and opened into a nice sized bathroom. The other was shut and had a piece of blue, A4 card taped to it with the word ‘ADORA’ written on it in different colours, surrounded by crude drawings of flowers. Adora chuckled to herself at the sight.

“Here we go,” Glimmer announced before pushing open the door, “home sweet home!”

The room was beautifully lit with large windows that overlooked an enormous river below. Adora’s eyes widened at the sight. She didn’t realise the block was so close to Bright Moon’s docks. The view was gorgeous. To her left was a seriously comfy-looking double bed, and to her right, against the wall, were a sturdy desk and a wardrobe that was far too large for Adora, who didn’t own a great deal of clothing. She was overjoyed by her new space and was about to tell the others exactly that when she noticed a black mark on the wall above the desk.

“Um,” she started, “what’s that?”

Glimmer and Bow gave each other another concerned look.

“Well,” Glimmer seemed nervous, “our last flatmate was something of a-”

“Fire enthusiast!” Bow finished her sentence.

“I was gonna say raging pyromaniac.”

“Same difference,” Bow shrugged, “We were going to paint over it, but then we thought we’d let whoever moved in choose the paint colour and we could decorate the room together.”

Adora grinned. There was definitely a story behind the previous occupant of this room, and she was excited to hear it, but for now she was just thrilled by how open and welcoming her new flatmates were being. Maybe they _did_ have a good shot at being friends.

“That sounds like a great idea!” Adora decided that she was going to be brave. She screwed her eyes shut tight and launched herself forward to hug Glimmer and Bow. The pair accepted the expression of affection enthusiastically, and Adora felt comfortable for the first time in what seemed like forever. “Thank you both so much,” she breathed, “this is going to be great.”  
  


***

  
The rest of the morning proved to be exceedingly successful for Adora and her new friends (and she really was starting to think of Glimmer and Bow as friends). Bow drove Adora back to the motel to pick up her things. She’d packed her small case of clothes, her picture of Razz and her modest collection of books into the boot of his car and made sure to flip the bird at Bob and Carol, who were arguing by the front desk, on her way out. Upon arriving back at the flat, Glimmer had run through how they would be dividing up the bills (Adora’s share of which was cheap enough that she’d have some real spending money for the first time in her life), before the three students sat down for lunch and to run through décor ideas for Adora’s new room.

By 5pm the ‘Best Friend Squad’, as Bow was already insisting on calling their little trio, had been sitting in their living room, chatting for a good three hours. Adora had taken some time after lunch to unpack and have a short nap – she certainly needed it after her rude awakening that morning – but since waking up, she had been enjoying the perks of having friendly flatmates to talk to. For the last half an hour, Glimmer and Bow had been talking about their favourite movies and Adora had mostly just been listening, occasionally chipping in to make fun of Glimmer for her intense obsession with the _Fast and Furious_ movies.

“Hey! They’re not about cars, they’re about _family_!” She kept insisting, but Adora and Bow kept up the mockery, regardless. Talking to the pair of excitable goofs was surprisingly easy. They were the kind of people who liked to keep things light, but certainly weren’t afraid of expressing their feelings or being emotionally open. This was a little worrying for Adora because, while they hadn’t asked her a great deal of personal questions yet, she was sure that they’d want to get to know her on a deeper level before long and she certainly wasn’t ready to go delving into her past with two, frankly privileged cinnamon rolls, untarnished by the harsh realities of the world. Adora was, however, determined not to overthink things too much. These were early days after all.

A sudden ringing interrupted the mockery, and Adora noticed Glimmer’s usually beaming face fall.

“It’s my mum, hang on.” Glimmer lifted the phone to her ear and made a quick exit, heading towards her bedroom.

“What’s up with them?” Adora asked.

“They have a…” Bow paused, thinking of the right way to phrase it, “strained relationship. Glimmer and her mum love each other, _a lot_ , but Angella isn’t exactly thrilled by Glimmer’s career choices. She’s pretty overprotective and doesn’t think Glimmer’s cut out to be a doctor, especially since Glimmer’s dad died from cancer when she was small.”

This shocked Adora. Glimmer did not seem like the type who’d experienced that kind of loss. Maybe Adora was just projecting her own inability to cope with her losses, but she was filled with a newfound respect for the short, purple-haired girl whose kindness meant that she had somewhere to live that wasn’t a gross motel.

“Hey guys,” Glimmer had appeared in the doorway, snapping Adora out of her train of thought, “I have a question for you,” Glimmer was grimacing.

“Why have you got that face on your face?” Bow was now mirroring Glimmer’s grimace, “What’s the question?”

“Ya like jazz?” Glimmer said in her best Seinfeld voice, shooting her friends finget guns.

“WHAT?!?!” Bow yelled, utterly horrified, “Glimmer no. Do NOT tell me you’re dragging us out to some horrible bar to listen to trumpets!”

“Hey, I don’t like it either, but there’s a postgrad society social at this jazz bar in town called The Grotto, and mum’s insisting, on pain of death, that we take Adora so she can make some friends.”

Bow let out a zombie-like groan.

“I actually kinda like jazz,” Adora said quietly. Bow and Glimmer turned their heads sharply to look at her with faces that sat somewhere between horrified and confused, “I had a friend at school who was a pretty talented musician and she made me listen to a bunch of jazz. I never got into the more hardcore stuff, but I did quite like some of the classics.”

Bow let out a haggard breath.

“Fine, if you’re mum is insisting, then let’s go and try to ignore some jazz for a couple hours, but you’re inviting Mermista and Perfuma, Glimmer. If Adora is making new friends tonight, then they may as well be good ones.”  
  


***  
  


From the outside, The Grotto looked like a bit of a dump. There was a small sign with unassuming font hanging above a staircase that led down into the basement bar, and a chalk sandwich board with ‘Free Jazz Night’ written on it in a messy scrawl.

“This looks pretty depressing, guys,” Glimmer deadpanned.

The Best Friend Squad were huddled under Bow’s umbrella, staring at the sandwich board which was illuminated by the reflection of a streetlight in a nearby puddle. Glimmer had heard jazz and immediately thought ‘Gatsby’, so her and Bow had dressed up to match the aesthetic of the Baz Luhrmann movie. Bow was wearing a black suit with a crisp white shirt and purple bow tie, while Glimmer was sporting a sparkly blue dress. Adora, on the other hand, knew that jazz in the 21st century was a pretty casual affair and, not wanting to stick out like a sore thumb, went with a leather jacket, jeans and the same t-shirt she’d put on that morning. That being said, it’s not like she’d had much of an option. She’d never owned any fancy clothes, and there was no way anything of Glimmer’s would have fit her even if she had wanted to dress up for the occasion. Honestly, Adora was feeling a little left out standing next to her new friends.

 _Screw it_ , Adora thought to herself. She’d heard people on TV talking about how the best way to feel confident is to act as if you’re confident so, with that in mind, she strode out from under the umbrella, beckoning the others to follow her down the stairs and into The Grotto.

“Oh,” she muttered to herself as she pushed open the door, “this is pretty cool.”

You wouldn’t have guessed it from the outside, but the bar was pretty crowded. Despite being a basement venue, the room was fairly spacious. At the far end was a small, slightly raised platform with an upright piano facing the left-hand wall, a double bass resting on its side in the middle, and a fairly stripped back drum set on the left. The rest of the room was taken up by small, round wooden tables, surrounded by chairs and illuminated by little tea lights in red glasses. Most of the people were either sitting at the tables, chatting and nursing drinks, or lined up at the bar which ran the length of the right-hand wall. Some quiet piano jazz that Adora didn’t recognise was being piped through speakers at the back of the stage. All in all, the atmosphere was low-key and welcoming but in an effortlessly trendy way. Maybe jazz was making some kind of hipster comeback that had completely gone over Adora’s head.

“Oooooo,” came Bow’s voice from behind her. Clearly, he was as pleasantly surprised as Adora was, “Hey Glim, do you think we might be a bit overdressed?”

“Just own it, Bow,” Glimmer confidently strode past her friends, “let’s go get a table.”

Adora chuckled and followed Glimmer to a table a good distance from the stage. It was a little disappointing to be sat so far away – Adora had always loved watching musicians play. There was something about seeing someone’s hands flying across a keyboard or a set of strings that she found mesmerising. At this point Adora was pretty lost in thought, only vaguely picking up on what her friends were talking about.

“So are Mermista and Perfuma coming?”

“Yeah, apparently, they were planning on coming anyway, but they’re running late. Mermista’s boyfriend is in the band.”

“Wait, Mermista has a boyfriend?”

“It was news to me too, but you know how private she is.”

“I would be too if my boyfriend was a jazz musician.”

“At least _she_ has a boyfriend.”

“Ugh, point taken my sparkly friend.”

Adora was suddenly brought back to reality when the speakers let out an unpleasant jolt of feedback. She looked up to see that the bartender, a tall slender person with wispy blond hair and a green silk shirt, was holding a microphone from behind the bar.

“Hello, my dears,” they drawled seductively, “welcome to The Grotto’s weekly jazz night, I'm your exalted host, Double Trouble.”

There was a light ripple of applause.

“I understand that there are some overachieving eggheads from the University here tonight for a social event,”

More applause. Bow and Glimmer cheered.

“Well, you are politely requested to keep your voices, hands and genitals to yourselves for a little while because it’s time for some music from our superbly talented house band. Entrapta, spotlight!”

Another round of light applause rippled out of the crowd as a spotlight lit up the stage and three musicians walked out from a side door and sat at their instruments. Adora couldn’t make out what they looked like from their position at the far side of the room, so she decided to focus on listening instead. A hush fell over the dimly lit bar as the bassist started plucking out the introduction to the first tune. After being joined by the drummer, playing quietly with brushes rather than sticks, the bassist built to a light groove, making way for the entrance of the piano. The pianist began to improvise a few fractured ideas, slowly piecing abstract clusters of notes together to form a melody that Adora recognised, one with a real sense of longing to it. Suddenly, the tune clicked clicked into place in her memory. This was a jazz standard that Adora had heard many times before, though not for a few years now. The version Adora was familiar with had words though, and she began singing along in her head to the pianist’s eerie rendition:

_Make someone happy_

_Make just one someone happy_

_Make that one heart the heart you sing to_

The tune was bringing out memories that Adora had pushed down for years. She had to get a look at the musicians that were causing her to have such a vivid, nostalgic experience.

“I’m gonna go get a closer look,” she whispered to her companions, who nodded as she quietly got up from the table and went to stand by the bar where she’d have a better angle on the pianist.

_One smile that cheers you_

_One face that lights when it nears you_

_One girl you’re everything to_

As Adora reached the bar, the musicians slowly came to a stop, the pianist lingering on the last note until it finally stopped reverberating on its own. Her breath caught in her throat as the woman at the piano, turned in her seat to make a slight bow to the audience. Adora stopped breathing entirely as the woman lifted her face to the crowd.

 _Catra_.


	3. Good Morning Heartache

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one has a lotta jazz lingo in it. I've made reference playlists for Adora and Catra and the House Band which I'll post a link to if people want it. Comment and let me know.

**Catra**

_Get. Up._

“No.”

_Seriously. Get. Up._

“Fiiinnne.”

Catra forced herself to sit up straight in bed (well, couch, to be more accurate). She squinted at the clock on the wall above the fridge. 3pm. There was a loud clatter from downstairs. Catra winced, her head was pounding like hell. She inwardly cursed herself for getting hammered the previous night, but seriously, how else was she expected to deal with the endless misogynistic cat calling of the oafish blokes from the stag do who’d monopolised The Grotto until the small hours of the morning? The last time she’d beaten the crap out of a patron, Double Trouble had threatened to kick her out on the street, so drinking was her last remaining option.

_Get. UP._

It took all of the 23-year-old’s willpower just to get her feet to touch the floor.

_Water, I need water._

It was either that or she’d throw up over herself, which would have been a huge no-no considering she was still wearing last night’s work clothes – her only set.

Catra hauled herself up and across the room to the sink.

_No glasses. Why are there never any glasses? Oh, fuck it._

Catra turned on the tap and stuck her face under it. The water was freezing cold, hydrating her and jolting her wide awake simultaneously. The shock of the cold water wouldn’t last long though. She needed coffee.

_What smells weird?_

Catra lifted her right arm and put her nose closer to her armpit, before gagging violently. She absolutely reeked of booze and sweat, but a shower would have to wait until after coffee. Still pretty disoriented, Catra hobbled downstairs to the bar, holding onto the bannister for dear life. Her stomach was sloshing around like nobody’s business, and the nausea was coming on strong. The young musician was _this_ close to swearing off tequila for good; it may get her drunk quicker, but the hangovers were absolutely not worth it.

Catra was able to relax a little as she reached the bottom of the stairs. The Grotto itself was far dimmer than the living room upstairs, with the only sources of light being the three small windows above the front door and a desk lamp on the bar, shining over the venue’s financial books. Double Trouble was behind the bar, cleaning glasses and humming tunelessly to themselves. The combined sounds of the clinking glasses and the barkeep’s tone-deaf humming made Catra cringe.

“Bitch, you own a jazz bar, can’t you pick a key and stick to it?” Catra groaned at her boss/landlord/friend.

“Darling, if I could sing then I’d be up on that stage instead of behind this bar,” this made Catra chuckle, despite herself. Double Trouble was as outlandish as it comes, hence the ridiculous name which they had chosen for themselves, and could always make Catra laugh no matter how determined she was to be in a bad mood, “I take it you’re looking for coffee.”

Catra grunted in the affirmative.

“I put a pot on as soon as I heard your groaning from upstairs.”

“Thanks DT, you’re a life saver.” Catra ducked under the counter to get behind the bar and at the promised pot of coffee. As she got closer, the smell hit her nose. Glorious.

“Don’t thank me just yet Cat,” Double Trouble mumbled, “you’re gigging tonight.”

Catra wheeled around on the spot, coffee pot and mug in hand.

“What?!” _Was today Monday?_

“Oh yeah, it’s Monday alright. I figured you’d probably have lost track of the days of the week from the way you were pounding the tequila last night,” it was freakish the way DT could read Catra’s mind sometimes, “I tried to stop you, but you seemed really determined to get absolutely bladdered.”

Catra cringed. She vaguely remembered her boss trying to grab the bottle from her after her third shot.

“Hey, at least I didn’t beat up a customer again.”

“Well yes, that’s certainly a relief, dear. Do you think you’ll be in playing shape for tonight?”

Catra took a deep breath through her nose, which made her sinuses burn.

“A cup of coffee and a couple hours practice and I’ll be ready to blow the roof off the place.”

“Better make that an hour, Kitty,” DT warned, “I’m gonna need your help setting up this dump for tonight. We’ve got a bunch of postgrads from the university coming in for a social.”

“Seriously?! A bunch of twentysomethings here to get smashed on jazz night?” Catra shut her eyes tight and pinched the bridge of her nose, “This is gonna be a tough crowd.”

“No kidding!” the voice of her closest friend and bandmate, Scorpia, boomed from the entrance. Catra turned around to see the buff, tall woman marching in through the door with her double bass strapped to her back and a kick drum nestled under her left arm.

“That’s why I’m bringing in a drummer for tonight’s set. Liven things up a bit, you know?” Scorpia put the drum down on the floor as the front door shut behind her and wiped the back of her hand across her forehead.

“You’re kidding me, who?” Catra groaned. Most drummers were total meatheads and they’d yet to find a half decent one in the five years Catra had been living in this god-awful city.

“Some conservatoire burnout called Sea Hawk.”

“ _That’s_ his _name_?!” Double Trouble piped up from behind the bar.

Catra and Scorpia simultaneously shot them a look.

“Okay… point taken.”

“Is he any good?” Catra probed. She didn’t want to be dealing with some total waster who played too loud and couldn’t even keep time again.

“Word around campus is that he’s a bit of a wildcard, but he’s a seriously good player.”

“Fine,” Catra conceded, “go set up the kit.”

“Hey, Wildcat, you may be the hot shit improvisor,” Catra smirked, this much was true, “but this is my operation. You can run the show once you nut up and audition for the conservatoire. That’s the agreement.”

This was a sore point for the duo. They’d been playing together ever since Catra had arrived in Bright Moon. She’d gotten her start in jazz back at Horde Military Academy during the worst years of her life. It had started out as a way to avoid drills with Sgt. Weaver. Catra was able to ditch the old witch’s exercise regimen, during which she had come to expect a great deal of bullying from their bitter teacher, by going to music lessons with an old, retired military band leader called Eddie Edwards (that was his stage name). After a while, however, the lessons stopped being just an avoidance tactic and became just about the only thing Catra was passionate about during her teen years.

 _Well, that and_ her _._

No. Catra was _not_ going to think about Adora.

Her piano lessons with Eddie were her solace from her bitter reality. The old man brought out her innate musical talent and a real love of all things jazz. When Catra’s best friend ( _who will not be named_ ) left her ( _I mean, the school_ ) when she was 16, she threw all her energy into her music. In her final year at that hell hole, Eddie had promised to recommend her for an audition at the Bright Moon University Conservatoire. The university had an annual competition for jazz students, the winner of which would receive a recording contract with Princess Alliance Records (one of the UK’s leading jazz labels) to release an album of original music. Before Eddie got the chance, however, that bitch Weaver had him fired for ‘unprofessional conduct’, whatever that meant. Catra was certain that the spiteful sergeant had done it on purpose, just to stab Catra in the back and, just like with everyone else who left her behind, Catra never heard from Eddie again.

“Oh, fuck off, Scorpia,” Catra seethed, “I’m not relitigating this with you again.”

“Well, if you’re not gonna audition, you could at least go to campus and try to meet some new people to jam with… maybe make some new friends?” DT suggested, cautiously.

“You can fuck off too.” Catra gave her only friends in the world the finger and took her coffee over to the piano. Some practice would help her take her mind off the bullshit.

As she sat down on the creaky piano stool, Catra took a swig of her coffee and tried her best to tune out Scorpia and DT, who were now gossiping about someone or other over by the bar. Practicing scales always made her feel better, she could just let her fingers fly in repetitive patterns up and down the keys of the bar’s shitty upright piano until her mind went totally blank. The young pianist cracked her knuckles and pulled her pair of knitted, grey, fingerless gloves out of her pocket and pulled them on. She knew they restricted her movement a little, but it was worth it to avoid audience members coming up to her after the set to ask about all her scars.

The car crash that had killed her mum and landed her in that shit heap of a military school for ‘the disadvantaged youth’, had also caused serious burns to the back of her hands and the kids at HMA would ask her about it all the time. The questions hadn’t stopped once she left, and nor had the painful memories. The scarring didn’t affect her ability to play piano, but they made it so much harder for her to concentrate on the music if she had to look at her scars whenever she needed to get through a particularly difficult section of a tune or make a tricky key change, mid-solo. In all honesty, the scars were one of the big things standing between her and auditioning. She knew the audition panel would make her take off the gloves, and she knew that having to see her scars would make her fuck up the performance. With the gloves fitted snugly over her hands, Catra straightened her back, took in a deep breath, closed her eyes and started running through her scales.  
  
***  
  
6:50pm found Catra and DT lighting candles on each of The Grotto’s 20 tables, ready for opening at 7pm. Usually the bar would open at 5pm for happy hour, but on jazz night they pushed it until later to give the band and their resident tech genius, Entrapta, time for sound check. Today’s soundcheck had been a little more eventful than usual. Scorpia had dropped tonight’s setlist on the piano stand while Catra was practicing, before making herself scarce. Catra hadn’t bothered to look at the setlist until just before soundcheck was due to start.

_“Scorpia, do I really have to play this boring shit again?” Catra spat as the bassist walked up to the stage, followed by a douchey looking white guy with a bright blue waistcoat and a waxed moustache. This must be the bloody drummer._

_“I told you, Wildcat, you get to pick the setlist when you get your shit together and audition.”_

_Catra should have seen that one coming._

_“Ooooo, you’re auditioning for the conservatoire? That’ll be an ADVENTURE!!” the douchey looking guy sounded douchey, too._

_“Who’s this joker?” Catra directed her question at Scorpia rather than the drummer, “And I’m NOT auditioning, so shut up about it!”_

_Scorpia sighed, “This is Sea Hawk, he’s the drummer I told you about earlier.”_

_“Right,” Catra took another look at Sea Douche, and then returned her attention to the setlist, “seriously though, dude, if you’re gonna make me play all this cheesy Latin stuff can I at least pick one tune as like, a fucking pallet cleanser?”_

_“Okay, fine,” Scorpia relented. It may be selfish, but Catra knew that Scorpia was seriously fond of her and would let her do whatever as long as she pushed hard enough, “you can pick_ one _tune, but it’s gotta be a standard, and we’re getting it out the way at the top of the show.”_

 _“Yes!” Catra pumped her fist, “Let’s do_ Make Someone Happy. _Hey, Sea Douche,”_

_“Who, me?”_

_“Yeah, you! You think you can manage a medium tempo swing?”_

_“Why of course, fair lady! At the Conservatoire they call me the King of Swing!”_

_“Dude,” Scorpia interjected, “you got kicked out of the Conservatoire. I’m pretty sure they don’t call you anything.”_

_Catra snorted. Scorpia could be funny when she wanted._

_“I’ll write out a quick chart for you Scorpia, I’ve been working on a new arrangement. Should be pretty easy to pick up. Let’s run it before ‘Trapta gets here.”_

The run through of Catra’s new version of _Make Someone Happy_ went pretty smoothly, and while Sea Hawk had been a little overzealous with his drumming, that was fixed after a smack on the back of the head from Scorpia and her beefy arms. She was thankful that Scorpia had allowed her to add the song to the setlist so last-minute. _Make Someone Happy_ was one of her favourite tunes. Eddie had played it for her in one of their first lessons together, and it was the first jazz standard that had really captured her imagination. After the lesson, Eddie gave her a little MP3 player and a pair of earphones that she kept hidden in her bunk at the Academy for the rest of her time there. On it were 20 or 30 recordings of various jazz standards by everyone from Ella Fitzgerald, to John Coltrane to Bill Evans and even modern British singers like Jamie Cullum and Amy Winehouse. She used to make Adora listen to Jamie Cullum’s rendition of _Make Someone Happy_ on repeat when they had a little time alone together ( _stop thinking about Adora!_ ). Catra really wanted to get creative with this version, so she’d picked some much more out-there chords to reharmonize the melody with and got Scorpia and Sea Hawk to really liven up the groove. She was genuinely proud of it, which wasn’t something that happened often for her.

After they had finished lighting the candles Catra went out the side door while Double Trouble opened the doors for the customers. Scorpia and Sea Hawk were waiting outside for her, sharing a joint. Scorpia looked over to her as the side door swung shut.

“Want some?” she held out the joint for Catra to take.

“No thanks, I don’t like smoking before a gig. Makes me anxious.”

“More for me then!” Sea Hawk practically sang, grabbing at Scorpia’s outstretched hand.

“Jesus, dude,” Catra growled, “tone it the fuck down.”

They were due on at 7:30pm, and as the minutes passed and her bandmates chatted away behind her, Catra found herself tapping her foot in anticipation. She wasn’t sure why, but there was something about tonight’s performance that had her feeling more nervous than usual. She’d always felt fairly comfortable on stage as long as she was behind a piano, so it definitely wasn’t stage fright. Tonight just felt… different.

“ _Hello, my dears_ ,” Catra heard Double Trouble’s ‘stage voice’ coming through the house PA, “ _welcome to The Grotto’s weekly jazz night._ ”

“Here we go, you two,” Scorpia whispered, “let’s give them hell!”

“ _I understand that there are some overachieving eggheads from the University here tonight for a social event_ ,”

Catra grimaced as she heard some piercing yelps from the crowd.

“ _Well, you are politely requested to keep your voices, hands and genitals to yourselves for a little while because it’s time for some music from our superbly talented house band. Entrapta, spotlight!_ ”

That was their cue. Catra pushed open the side door as the spotlight clunked on, and the band made their way onto the stage and over to their instruments, accompanied by light applause. As she sat down on the piano stool, Catra took a deep breath in through her nose and pulled her gloves tighter against her skin. She looked over at Scorpia and gave her the slightest nod, signalling that she should kick off the intro to _Make Someone Happy_.

Catra sat with her hands at the ready, listening to Scorpia and Sea Hawk building up the groove in preparation for her entrance. She closed her eyes and her fingers found their place on the keys from muscle memory. Sea Hawk cued her in, and she began to play, slowly improvising little clusters of melody, playing around with fragments of the tune before piecing them together to play the head in full. She ran the words to the song in her head, which helped her keep track of the tune’s structure.

_Make someone happy_

_Make just one someone happy_

_Make that one heart the heart you sing to_

She never felt better than when she was pouring herself into her playing, and tonight she was really hitting that pocket of emotion that fuelled her very best performances.

_One smile that cheers you_

_One face that lights when it nears you_

_One girl you’re everything to_

The song was coming to an end, but Catra didn’t want to let go of it. She held on to the final chord for as long as the piano would continue to reverberate, taking a breath as the last note finally died and gave way to silence. Applause began to flood the emptiness and Catra turned in her seat to face the audience. She gave a slight bow and then raised her head to look out into the crowd. Her eyes fell on a tall, blond woman standing by the bar.

_Wait, is that…?_

Catra’s breath caught in her throat. If that _was_ her, then she couldn’t wait around to find out. She wouldn’t make it through the rest of the show wondering whether it was really her.

“Scorpia,” she turned frantically to her bandmate, “give me _five minutes_.”

She didn’t wait for an answer from her friend, leaping out of her seat and across the stage towards the bar. The spotlight caught her eyes as she reached the edge of the stage, temporarily obscuring her vision. As her foot hit the floor, her vision cleared, and she saw the blond ponytailed woman disappear out the front door. Catra followed suit.

The wind and drizzling rain of Bright Moon in October hit her as she barged through the front door. She looked to her right and saw the woman hunched over on the bottom step of the staircase leading up to the street.

“Adora?”


	4. Delta City Blues

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who has been reading so far and leaving kudos and comments. Your encouragement of my procrastination is thoroughly appreciated! 
> 
> For anyone interested, here are the links to the playlists for Adora and Catra. I'll post the others in the notes for future chapters:
> 
> Adora: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2TCG5rC170jVNJETQHD4y9?si=B982GC6QT96iJJ42XIRi7w  
> Catra: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0oT5lmJ2OKIEnSEPqhKwKi?si=eH5CF-CkQJe53GwNrMAeRQ

**Adora**

_Catra_.

Her estranged former best friend’s mismatched eyes caught hers in a sudden flash of intense emotion. Hurt? Confusion? Happiness? Anger? Adora couldn’t tell which emotions were running across Catra’s face, but she knew she couldn’t hold her gaze any longer. Spinning on the spot, Adora made a break for the door, hoping against hope that the applause would cover her exit. The rain hit her face as she pushed through the door and Adora relished the feeling. Without the sensory shock of the cold and the wet, she might have carried on running until she got back to the flat – she didn’t have keys yet, so that would have been a problem.

She didn’t at all know how to feel about seeing Catra again. She had missed her friend desperately every day since they had parted, but the two girls had not separated on good terms, and while Adora had the excuse of Hordak and Weaver’s interference preventing her from making contact while Catra had still been at HMA, Adora had given up entirely on reconnecting with her friend after Razz died. Even if their separation had not been Adora’s fault in the slightest, their lack of reconnection definitely was. Adora was still reflecting on this as she sat down on the bottom step of the flight leading up to the street above, not caring in the slightest that her jeans would be sopping wet when she stood up again, or that the rain would completely screw up her tightly tied-back hair.

“Adora?” a voice from her past came from the entrance to the bar. She looked up to see the familiar, yet somehow entirely new sight of Catra’s striking eyes piercing into hers.

“Y-you… played our song,” Adora choked back through tears. Catra looked momentarily startled.

“You remember it?” She breathed, eyes softening for the briefest moment before she shook her head violently and her features hardened again, “Why are you here? You completely ruined my concentration!”

Adora was taken aback by her old friend’s sudden outburst.

“I guess I can leave, if you want me t-”

“I think that would be for the best, Princess.” The jibe made Adora wince. After seven years, Catra still knew how to get under her skin.

“Okay, you played…” Adora paused, pointlessly wiping away tears from her rain-soaked face, “beautifully.”

Catra huffed, dismissively, “Just get your shit and leave,” her voice faltered a little, “please.”

Just at that moment, the door opened again, and three figures emerged, silhouetted by glare from the streetlights above.

“Adora, are you okay?” It was Glimmer, with Bow hot on her heels. Adora looked up at her new friends.

“Can we go, please?” She pleaded, tears still pouring from her eyes. Glimmer nodded with eyes full of concern. The third figure, who Adora now recognised as the bassist in Catra’s band, put her hand on the pianist’s shoulder.

“Wildcat, we need to get back on stage.”

Catra nodded, solemnly, and turned to follow her bandmate back inside.

“I miss you,” Adora whimpered as the door swung shut behind them, not knowing for sure whether or not the sentiment reached its intended target.  
  
***  
  
In total silence, Bow and Glimmer walked home with their arms wrapped tightly around Adora’s shoulders. Upon arriving back at the flat, Bow sat Adora down on the sofa and wrapped her in a blanket while Glimmer disappeared behind the kitchen island. The shortest member of the Best Friend Squad returned moments later armed with a bottle of red wine and three, _large_ , glasses. After filling all three, nearly to the brim, and passing one to each of her friends, Glimmer joined Adora and Bow on the couch. Adora took a large gulp of wine and sat back against the sofa, breathing deeply.

“Thank you, I needed that.”

“I thought as much,” Glimmer chuckled, “so, go on. Dish!”

“Glim, come on,” Bow pleaded softly, “give the girl a second.”

“That’s okay, Bow,” Adora reassured him before taking another large swig from her glass, “I definitely owe you guys an explanation for dragging you away from that place before your friends even showed up.”

Bow smiled reassuringly and nodded.

“So, who was she?” Glimmer asked, a little gentler this time, “The hot piano girl who got you so worked up.” Adora blushed a deep red (not dissimilar to the shade of the wine).

“It’s a long story,” Adora started.

“Hey, we’ve got all night.”

“Right,” she took a deep breath and continued, “her name’s Catra. We were in care together, growing up, at a military academy for orphaned kids – not the nicest place to spend your childhood. I was moved there after my Dad died. Catra had already been living there for three years, and she took care of me while I was in a really messed up place.”

“That must have been so hard,” Glimmer placed a comforting hand over Adora’s, “I know what it’s like to lose a parent, so if you _ever_ want to talk about it,”

“Thank you,” Adora replied, and she meant it, “anyway, I was there for six years and Catra and I got really close. The teachers there were awful to all of us, Catra in particular, and we always did our best to stand up for each other. A lot of the time it felt like it was the two of us against the world, and we shared everything. You might have guessed by now, but Catra was the one who got me into jazz. She used to get out of drills every other day for piano lessons – she had a real knack for it.”

“Clearly you didn’t skip drills though,” Bow marvelled, “look at those _arms_!”

“Bow, not the time!” Glimmer hissed, causing Adora to laugh. The alcohol was starting to kick in. Thank god. “Sorry Adora, carry on.”

Adora nodded, “When I was 16, an elderly woman named Razz came to the academy to see me. The headmaster was seriously pissed off about it because the school had pretty strict rules against outside contact, but they were legally required to let people in who wished to adopt one of the students. It turned out that Razz’s daughter, Mara, had been a patient in my Dad’s ward when he was sick, and they’d become good friends. She’d promised him she’d take care of me after he died when she was out of the hospital. Unfortunately, she died not long after, but she’d made Razz promise to track me down. HMA was a pretty shady institution, and pretty off-the-books, so it took her a few years.”

Adora looked up at her friends, their eyes were wide with curiosity and empathy, which spurred her on.

“She insisted on getting me out of that place as soon as possible. I asked if she could take Catra too, but she was pretty elderly, and one troubled teenager was more than enough for her to handle. Catra was really hurt when I told her I was being taken away. Without me, she’d have nobody to stand up for her when Sgt. Weaver would get sadistic, but it’s not like I had much of a choice in the matter. Catra didn’t talk to me at all for the three days between Razz’s visit and my departure, she just holed herself up in the barracks crying. In all honesty, I’ve never really forgiven myself for leaving her behind. I should have tried harder to convince Razz or convinced them to let me stay at the academy.”

“What good would that have done?” Bow asked, “Clearly Catra’s managed to achieve something with her talents and you’ve made a life for yourself, too. Plus,” he smiled, “you’re both here in Bright Moon now. Maybe you have a second chance.”

“No,” Adora said solemnly, “she’s still angry. I don’t think she wants anything to do with me at all.” At this, the floodgates broke and Adora was hacking sobbing. Glimmer pried the wine glass from her clenched fist, set it down on the coffee table and enveloped the blond in a crushing hug, followed closely by a tear-stricken Bow.

They stayed like that for a while, slowly rocking back and forth for almost an hour while Adora’s sobs slowly subsided. She didn’t know what she did to deserve such caring friends. The three had been perfect strangers only a few hours ago, but now it felt as if they had known each other for years. Adora had _never_ in her life felt this comfortable with anyone but Catra. The thought made her want to cry again, but she managed to hold back the tears by focusing on the arms wrapped around her. The pressure felt incredible, like Bow and Glimmer were squeezing the heartbreak right out of her.

Eventually, the three friends broke their embrace and they all picked up their abandoned wine glasses. Drinking still felt like the appropriate course of action for the remainder of the evening.

“Can I ask a question?” Adora turned to look at Glimmer who had a searching look on her face.

“Sure,” she replied cautiously, “with all the crying I’ve done today, I reckon you’ve earned the right to ask whatever you want.”

“Okay,” Glimmer chuckled, before her face turned serious again, “why haven’t you contacted Catra before tonight?”

“Well,” Adora composed herself, sitting up straight, “while she was still at the academy that was pretty much impossible because of Hordak’s rules. When I finished school I tried again, but I couldn’t find record of her anywhere in London and I had no idea where she might have gone. I was still pretty determined though, until Razz died. After that I kinda lost hope in everything. I just focused on finishing my degree so I could move somewhere new and get a fresh start.”

“Yeah, that makes sense,” Bow spoke up after a moment of silence, “don’t you think Catra might want to hear that? To get some closure at least?”

Adora shook her head. “She doesn’t want me in her life. She made that pretty clear.”

“What exactly did she say to you?” Glimmer probed.

“She said-” Adora got choked up a little and tried again, “She told me that I’d messed up her gig and that I should get my shit and leave.”

“I don’t know, Adora,” pondered Glimmer, “that might’ve been harsh in the moment, but I don’t think it necessarily means she never wants to see you again. Clearly, she was just pretty shocked to see you. I can understand if she felt that she couldn’t do her job properly and worry about you at the same time.”

Adora considered this. Maybe Glimmer was right. It might even be worth going back to the bar and trying to get hold of her old friend. But that was future Adora’s problem.

“Maybe,” Adora started, “but for now, can we go back to getting bladdered?”

“I’ll drink to that!” Her friends exclaimed in unison.

**Catra**

The rest of the gig had been fine. The audience had seemed pretty perplexed when Catra and Scorpia made their way back to the stage, and Double Trouble had looked pretty miffed, but they’d gotten through the rest of the setlist without issue or interruption. Catra’s playing had been pretty uninspired though, and not just because Scorpia’s choice of tunes bored her senseless. She’d been rather preoccupied with the image of her former best friend’s tear and rain-soaked face. Adora had looked up at her with eyes full of remorse, and it honestly scared Catra how genuine she had seemed.

For years, the pianist had constructed a memory of Adora that painted her as cold and unfeeling, without a care in the world for how her actions had affected Catra. It would almost have been easier seeing her again if she had lived up to her false memory, at least then she wouldn’t feel so conflicted about the way she had dismissed her. After Adora had left HMA with that old woman, Catra had worked so hard, without the help of anyone (especially after Eddie was dismissed), to build a future for herself. She had devoted herself to her music, not just because it was the one thing that she was truly good at, but because it meant she didn’t have to sit with the reality that Adora’s leaving had hurt her even more than the loss of her mother. A therapist would probably tell her that she had serious abandonment issues, and Catra had decided that instead of getting some privileged academic type to ‘help’ her, it would be easier just to make sure that she never got close enough to anyone who could ever possibly leave her. Not even Scorpia was close enough to her that Catra would be especially hurt if she left.

Adora was the first and last person Catra had ever let in, and even if she could forgive her for leaving (it’s not like Adora had a choice in the matter), she definitely couldn’t see herself forgiving her for breaking the part of her that trusted anyone. What was she even doing in Bright Moon?

_Oh, of course!_

It was postgrad social night. She must have come in with the egghead crowd. Catra suppressed her instinct to be proud of Adora for making it through university. Of course, she’d done it, that old lady was probably rich enough to put her through university comfortably, and Adora was always way better at school than her.

After they’d finished the last tune, Catra hadn’t even stuck around on stage long enough to hear the applause that followed. Making her way through the crowd, she’d stuck her arm behind the bar and pulled out a bottle of tequila (screw her resolution from earlier in the day, she needed it) and escaped upstairs. That’s where Catra was now, sprawled out on the couch, drowning her sorrows with copious amounts of booze. Why was she worrying about Adora, anyway? It’s not like she’d needed her at all since making it to Bright Moon. Catra had made a life for herself where she had people to look out for her, and who didn’t expect anything in return other than to play her heart out on stage once a week – something that she would do for nothing.

 _Some life_.

Catra’s immediate surroundings _were_ pretty depressing. For a fleeting moment, Catra wondered if she would have had the courage to audition for the conservatoire had Adora stuck around to support her.

 _Nope_.

She drowned that thought, along with everything else, with more tequila.  
  
***  
  
Catra woke up with a start at 4AM.

She was sweating like a pig, but she wasn’t hungover. Slowly, she lowered her feet to the floor and made an attempt to stand. Managing to get herself upright, Catra stood still as the world spun a little around her. Okay, she was still a little tipsy, but she knew what would help her orient herself. It was quiet. The late shift bartender must’ve closed up for the night. Catra checked to make sure DT’s bedroom door was shut, before slowly making her way downstairs. Making sure to return the almost empty bottle of tequila to its spot behind the bar first, Catra grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge and the desk lamp from the far end of the bar before heading over to the piano.

After setting up the lamp to illuminate the keys and, taking a healthy swig from the water bottle to help stave off any oncoming headaches, Catra cracked her knuckles and pulled off her gloves. She looked, tentatively, at the scarring on the backs of her hands. If she distracted herself with one trauma, maybe she’d stop thinking about the other one. Taking a deep breath and closing her eyes, the pianist’s fingers automatically found their places on the keyboard and she began to play. At first, Catra just let her hands lead her through an improvised series of chords and patterns, until she began to recognise the chord sequence to a standard she remembered from her time at school.

 _So much for forgetting about Adora_.

This one was another shared favourite of theirs, called _I Cover the Waterfront_ , and like before, Catra sung through the words in her head as more memories from her teenage years flooded her mind.

_I cover the waterfront;  
I'm watching the sea  
Will the one I love be coming back to me?  
  
I cover the waterfront;  
In search of my love  
And I'm covered by a starlit sky above  
  
Here am I patiently waiting, hoping and longing  
Oh, how I yearn!  
Where are you?  
Have you forgotten?  
Will you remember?  
Will you return?  
  
I cover the waterfront  
I'm watching the sea  
Will the one I love be coming back to me?_

The last notes of the song rang in Catra’s ears as she lifted her fingers from the piano and pulled her gloves back on. Adora’s remorseful eyes burned into her psyche.

_I’m so fucked._


	5. I Can't Get Started

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cw: panic attack.

**Adora**

Adora sat on the bench outside the Bright Moon Youth Centre, resisting the temptation to look at her watch for the tenth time in the last two minutes. It had been two days since Adora’s run in with Catra at The Grotto and she was still feeling incredibly conflicted about it. Bow and Glimmer had assured her that Catra’s words probably didn’t mean she wanted Adora out of her life permanently, but she wasn’t so sure. She had spent most of the day yesterday recovering from a brutal hangover, and trying to learn a little more about her flatmates in an effort both to make up for how much of their first day together was centred around her, and to distract herself from thinking too much about Catra.

She’d been growing increasingly fond of the other members of the Best Friend Squad. Not only had they been unexpectedly supportive in her move and in the jazz night aftermath, but they were ridiculously fun to be around. Even when they were lying on the floor together the morning after, heads pounding and taking it in turns to run to the bathroom to heave, they were making each other laugh. Adora had always been sceptical when she’d heard people talking about having made an instant connection with other people, but she was now realising that with Bow and Glimmer, it might be real. Perhaps she needed people with their kind of social bravery who wouldn’t take no for an answer where friendship was concerned.

Unfortunately, Adora couldn’t stay lying on that floor forever. The requirements of her course beckoned, and she was now waiting, black coffee in hand, for the social worker she would be shadowing during her first semester. Angella had emailed her the details the previous afternoon, but beyond the name of the social worker and the time and place they were due to meet, she had not been able to give her any indication of what she should expect from her first day of field work.

Adora drained the last of her coffee and checked her watch once more.

_I shouldn’t worry, right? They’re only five minutes late._

Shaking her head a little, Adora fought the urge to start nervously tapping her foot. She’d always had a thing about punctuality and would get seriously stressed when other people weren’t running on time (although, for her, ‘on time’ usually meant fifteen minutes early). Being friends with Catra, Adora found herself confronted with this variety of stress a lot. They’d never had much free time, so whenever they lucked out and had a free hour to themselves, Adora would try to squeeze as much Catra time out of it as possible. Inevitably, Catra would show up ten minutes late, just about everywhere with only “I’m a jazz musician, Princess, what do you expect?” as her excuse. Adora smiled at the memory momentarily before Catra’s words rang in her ears again.

_Just get your shit and leave… please._

“Hello?” A voice snapped Adora out of what she was sure was the start of a particularly unpleasant thought spiral. Standing over her was a thirtysomething black woman with bright blue hair.

“You Adora Kahane?” the woman enquired.

“That’s me,” Adora got to her feet and held out a hand to shake, “sorry, I was a little zoned out there.”

“Hey, no worries! Nobody should have to be up this early,” the woman grinned and shook Adora’s hand enthusiastically, “I’m Netossa. Welcome to the Youth Centre.”

“Nice to meet you,” Adora smiled weakly. She definitely wasn’t zoned out because of the early start, but Netossa didn’t need to know that “I’m excited to learn from you.”

“You’re keen, I like it! Come on inside, I’ve got a few things to run through with you before we can start meeting with kids.”  
  
***  
  
Most of Netossa’s ground rules were pretty straightforward: everything you hear in the Youth Centre is confidential, don’t be in a room with the kids without a social worker present, don’t talk to the kids unless they talk to you first, don’t ask any leading questions about their trauma, don’t make physical contact, etc.

Sitting in Netossa’s office, Adora felt as if the social worker was building to something more significant. She was rushing through the ground rules, nervously tapping her pen against the desk, and avoiding eye contact with her new shadow.

“Okay, one last thing,” Netossa looked Adora right in the eyes. Here it comes. “Professor Colins informed me that you were in care growing up.”

Adora nodded.

“I know you can empathise with these kids, probably better than I can, but you’ve gotta remember that we have rules and protocols for a reason – the kids’ protection. That’s our number one concern, and just because you might understand what they’re going through, it doesn’t mean that you can go breaking those rules because you think you know better, okay?”

“Yeah, of course.”

“Alright then, let’s go meet our first appointment. Her name’s Frosta.”

“That’s a cool name.” Adora smiled, getting out of her chair to follow Netossa towards the office door.

“She’s a cool kid,” Netossa remarked, “but she’s pretty combative, so don’t be surprised if she tries to bait you into an argument.”

_Here goes_.  
  
***

**Catra**

The bar was spotless. After another sleepless night, Catra had given up on unconsciousness at 5AM and had come down to the bar to take out her frustration on the dirt and grime from last night’s crowd of drunks. Two hours later found the musician hunched over the bar, scribbling down fragments of ideas in her manuscript book. At the top of the page was written “I Cover the Waterfront”, and beneath it, incoherent sketches and thoughts that didn’t really seem to add up to very much.

There were two reasons that Catra couldn’t fall asleep. Lying in the dark and the quiet, her senses had been going into overdrive. On closing her eyes, images of Adora’s tear-stricken face haunted her, but almost worse than that, the silence would be broken by an incessant loop of _I Cover the Waterfront_ playing in her head. This told Catra one thing, that she wasn’t done with this tune yet. So, after her burst of aggressive cleaning energy, she had resolved to start planning out a new arrangement of the standard. It wouldn’t be enough to just play the song, Catra would have to really make it her own and do something unique with it in order for her to be able to move on from her subconscious fixation.

Catra threw her pencil down onto the bar in frustration and put her head in her hands. There were a bunch of ideas on the page in front of her, but right now they all seemed hollow and gimmicky. It wouldn’t be enough to change the time signature or throw in a reharmonization here and there. She’d have to completely rework the thing, and for that, she’d need a second pair of ears to make sure she wasn’t going overboard and losing the spirit of the original. She needed Scorpia. While she was sure, after five years of playing together, that she was the better musician of the two, Catra knew that Scorpia was one of the only people who knew how to cut through the complexity of her ideas and get to the simplicity at the heart of what she was trying to do. One of the reasons that Scorpia was so keen for Catra to study at the conservatoire was because she knew, as did Catra, that the only way to really capitalise on her potential as a musician, would be for her to have more experienced musicians giving her the feedback and outside perspective that she needed. Otherwise, Catra’s huge pool of ideas would just expand into an overcomplicated mess. Unfortunately, there was no way in hell that Scorpia would be awake at 7AM on a Monday, so Catra would have to stay plagued by this tune for a few more hours before she could really get to work on it.

Catra could feel her eyes starting to droop, but she couldn’t stomach the thought of going to sleep now. Coffee was a necessity, so she went to switch on the coffee machine and set about grinding up some of DT’s fancy beans. Just as her arms were starting to tire from grinding, Catra was startled by a sudden knock at the door.

_Who the fuck is knocking at a bar at 7AM?_

Catra had been forced to put up with some seriously desperate alcoholics in her time at The Grotto, but never ten hours before opening. Placing the coffee grinder back on the counter, Catra put on her best ‘fuck off out of my bar’ face before striding over to open the door. Much to her surprise, however, standing on the other side of the door was not a drunk, but a familiar, perky looking girl with purple hair and a pair of pale blue scrubs.

“Oh my god, you’re Catra,” the girl practically squealed, “I wasn’t expecting you to actually be here this early!”

“Wait,” Catra’s early morning brain fog began to lift as she looked down at the obnoxiously sparkly young woman, “you were here for jazz night, weren’t you?” Catra paused for a moment, “With Adora?”

“Yeah!” The girl squeaked again.

“Look Sparkles, I don’t know what you want, but the bar doesn’t open until five.”

“Okay,” the girl looked a little miffed by Catra’s impromptu nickname. Good. “firstly, the name’s Glimmer-”

“Wait seriously?!” Catra snorted.

“And secondly, I didn’t come here for booze, I came to speak to you.”

This caught Catra a little off guard. What could this new friend of Adora’s possibly want with her? They’d not exactly been all chummy the other night.

“Go on then, spill.” Catra spat, her confidence leaving her a little.

“Well,” Glimmer looked a little nervous, “Adora just moved into my flat, and my friend Bow and I are planning on throwing a surprise welcome party for her tonight when she gets home from work. Nothing huge, just a few friends, some booze and some tunes.”

Catra snorted at that last part. She could only imagine what this girl’s crappy taste in music must be like.

“And,” Glimmer paused and started rubbing the back of her neck, “I was wondering if you’d come along. I know it would make Adora really happy. She misses you.”

Catra was stunned. Why would Adora want to see her after their last interaction?

_Wait, this has fuck all to do with what Adora wants._

If Adora really wanted to see her, she would have come here herself. Sparkles was just meddling in something she doesn’t understand.

“Jesus, Sparkles,”

“Glimmer!”

“Sure, whatever,” Catra was amused at how much this little nickname was getting under the shorter woman’s skin, “this is much more complicated than your little head can comprehend, okay? The last thing I need right now is to see Adora, and whatever she’s told you, she doesn’t want shit to do with me either. So, if that’s all, you can get the hell out of here now.”

“Fine,” Glimmer fumed, turning on the spot, “I’ve got labs to get to anyway.”

“Oh, and a piece of advice, Sparkles,” Glimmer didn’t respond to this, choosing instead to simply bunch her fists tightly at her side, “the surprise party is a _bad_ idea. The princess is a major control freak. Can’t handle surprises.”

Before Glimmer had the chance to respond, Catra swung the door shut and locked it, for good measure. She had her own shit to deal with today and didn’t need any more disturbances from bright and shiny medical students. Intent on getting on with her day as normal, Catra went to resume making herself some coffee but, on picking up the grinder, noticed that her hands were shaking pretty violently.

_Sod this_. _Sorry Scorpia_.

Catra wasn’t going to sit around all day and let this stupid interaction fuck her up, so beauty sleep be damned, she picked up her phone and called Scorpia.  
  
***  
  
 **Adora**

Adora wanted to cry. As far as she could see it, Adora’s first day on the job couldn’t have gone any worse. Netossa, who Adora really liked, had tried to assure her otherwise, but from her perspective, she’d seriously screwed up. The _first_ warning Netossa had given her before their meeting with the girl, Frosta, had been “Remember, don’t let her rile you up. She’s just looking for a fight”. She should have listened. Adora cringed at the memory as she got into the lift up to the flat at Whispering Woods.

_“Hi Frosta, how are we doing this morning?” Netossa asked in a cheery voice as they walked into the meeting room. It was an inviting space with warm colours and big, comfy sofas and beanbags for sitting in. Frosta was sitting in an armchair in the far corner of the room, looking rather menacing despite her diminutive size. The girl must have been about 14. She was dressed in ragged ripped jeans, an ice blue hoodie and her hands (again, small, but they looked powerful) were tightly gripping the arms of the chair._

_“Who’s this bitch?” Frosta said nonchalantly, staring daggers right into Adora’s eyes. She flinched._

_“_ Frosta! _” Netossa exclaimed, without raising her voice too harshly, “I’d like you to apologise to Adora, right now. She’s my student and she hasn’t come here to be sworn at.”_

_“My deepest apologies for not addressing you properly,” Frosta smirked, “_ Your Majesty. _” The girl got up and curtsied sarcastically. To her surprise, Adora was far more affected by this moniker than Frosta’s previous slur. She felt an urge to yell at the kid for making assumptions but managed to supress it._

_“Seriously Netossa, couldn’t you save this prissy newbie for someone else?”_

_“Adora is here to learn, and you’re going to respect that, okay?” Netossa replied sternly._

_“Fine.”_

_“It’s nice to meet you Frosta,” Adora started, but Netossa shot her a look. Shit. She wasn’t supposed to speak with the kid unless she was spoken to._

_“Pffft,” Frosta dismissed her, “you’re out of your depth, sweetie.”_

_With every new infantilising nickname, Adora got a flash of Catra calling her ‘Princess’, and Adora saw red. Before she could stop herself, she was talking back again._

_“Listen here, you little-”_

_“Adora. Out.” Netossa interrupted, pointing at the door._

_Still fuming, Adora stood up and left the room. As the door slowly shut behind her, the rage started to fade, replaced instead by insecurity and remorse. She’d gone way, WAY, overboard._

_A few minutes later, the door opened again and Netossa walked out, concern all over her face._

_“Okay Adora, what happened in there?”_

_“I let her rile me up.” Adora looked at her feet._

_“No kidding.” She expect Netossa to sound angry, but instead she heard the older woman chuckle. Adora looked up to see her smiling kindly, “Look, Frosta has this sixth sense for knowing what will get under your skin,”_ Sounds like someone else I know, _“you shouldn’t worry about it too much, but you gotta work on having a thicker skin around these kids. This is a rough city to grow up in without a family.”_

_Adora nodded, putting her right arm across her abdomen and grabbing her left._

_“For now, I’d like you to go back to my office and write up a report on what just happened for your course journal and read through Frosta’s file – it’s on the desk. We’ve got plenty more admin to do today, so we can start fresh with the kids on Wednesday.”_

_“Okay.” Adora responded quietly._

_“Hey,” Netossa smiled again, “these are early days for you. You’ve got plenty of time to get better at this.”_

The rest of the day had been uneventful, just exceptionally boring. She had done a lot of file organising and spreadsheet updating, and while the tasks weren’t difficult, she had ended the day totally exhausted. She hadn’t left the youth centre until 7pm, and all she wanted, Adora thought to herself as she got out of the lift at the third floor, was to crash on the couch and eat junk food with Bow and Glimmer until she was ready to pass out for the night.

The hardest thing was thinking back to Netossa’s reminder that she had time to “get better” at this. She shouldn’t have to! She should have been more prepared for the kids to be like this. Maybe her time with Razz had made her soft. Maybe she would have been better at this if she’d stayed with Catra at the academy.

_No. Your time with Razz was a gift. Stop overthinking this._

In all honesty, Adora had a hard time agreeing with herself sometimes.

Adora pulled her new key to the flat from her bag and slid it into the lock. A few more seconds and she could relax with a cup of tea and forget about all of this. She pushed the door open.

“SURPRISE!!!!!!” A huge shout came from the inside of the flat.

Adora felt her hands tingle and her vision start to blur as she began to hyperventilate. Was a little peace and quiet too much to ask?


	6. Mercy, Mercy, Mercy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry about the lack of recent updates. I've just handed in a master's thesis and am currently getting started with a PhD program, so things have been pretty crazy lately. Hoping to update more frequently now that I have a little more free time. This chapter is a little short though, but I wanted to post something just so you know I'm still here.

**Adora**

“Shit, Adora are you okay?” she heard a faint voice that seemed as if it was coming from far away. It had been a couple of minutes since the shout of ‘surprise’ and Adora was now sitting on the floor with her back against the door, vision blurring and trying to ignore the weird, amorphous shapes floating in front of her eyes. She’d been hyperventilating a little too long. If she didn’t calm down soon, she’d pass out. The councillor at her old university had tried to give her techniques for dealing with her panic attacks whenever they got really bad, but there was only one thing that had ever really worked for Adora. When she was at the academy and having a particularly bad day, Catra would come and sit on her bed and they’d share earphones and listen to a favourite song of Catra’s called ‘I Cover the Waterfront’. Ever since leaving HMA, Adora would run the song through in her head to calm down, but it only worked if she could get a hold of herself in time before she could feel herself passing out.

_I cover the waterfront;  
I'm watching the sea  
Will the one I love be coming back to me?  
  
I cover the waterfront;  
In search of my love  
And I'm covered by a starlit sky above  
  
Here am I patiently waiting, hoping and longing  
Oh, how I yearn!  
Where are you?  
Have you forgotten?  
Will you remember?  
Will you return?  
  
I cover the waterfront  
I'm watching the sea  
Will the one I love be coming back to me?_

Adora made it through to the end of the song, and she could feel her breathing slowing to normal. Her other senses were starting to come back too, and she could feel that her back hurt from being hunched over on the floor. As her vision came back in to focus, Adora began to make out two vaguely friend-shaped blobs crouched in front of her. Slowly, the image began to sharpen, and the shapes revealed themselves to be a very worried looking Bow and Glimmer, the latter looked incredibly guilty, on the verge of tears.

“Hey, Adora, can you hear me?” Bow asked, softly.

“Yeah,” Adora croaked out between long, controlled breaths, “sorry about that guys.”

“ _You’re_ sorry?!” Glimmer almost shouted. Bow put a hand on her arm and Glimmer’s eyes widened. She lowered her voice and spoke again, “ _We’re_ the ones who scared you half to death.”

“It’s okay,” Adora smiled and began to push herself up off the floor slowly, to avoid dizziness, “how would you know that I can’t handle surprises for shit? We’ve only been friends for three days.”

Bow and Glimmer shared a look. _Okay, she really does look guilty_.

“We wanted to throw you a surprise welcome party so you’d know just how excited we are to have you here and,” Glimmer motioned into the living room behind her, “so you could meet our other friends.”

Adora was touched by this. She knew Glimmer meant well, but she’d never been good with surprises, particularly when she was as exhausted as she was in that moment.

“That’s such a lovely thought, Glimmer,” Adora croaked, putting her hand on her friend’s shoulder, both as a gesture of comfort and to steady herself – she was still feeling a little light headed, “I just wish you’d given me some warning. I don’t do well when I feel like I have no control over what’s happening to me.”

Glimmer looked at her feet. Clearly there was something eating at her.

“Okay, what’s going on with you?” Adora asked. She was worried now. Bow looked Glimmer in the eyes and nodded.

“Please don’t be mad at me,” Glimmer pleaded, “but I went to The Grotto this morning to see Catra.”

Adora was speechless. How was she supposed to feel about this? Glimmer went behind her back to talk to the one person who wanted _nothing_ to do with her at all.

“I wanted to see if she’d come tonight. I thought it might make you happy to see her here, but she said she didn’t want to,” Adora’s heart sank, “and then she told me that the surprise party was a bad idea because being out of control would make you uncomfortable.”

_She remembered that?_ If Catra remembered something that small about her, then maybe there was a chance for them to be friends again after all, especially if she made the effort to warn Glimmer about it.

“I was so mad at her for shooting down my invitation that I just assumed she was trying to get in my head, and I didn’t listen. I’m sorry, Adora.”

“It’s okay.” Adora replied quietly, still going over the implications of this new information in her head.

“Shall we tell the others to go home? We can always do this again another time.” Bow put his arm comfortingly around Adora’s shoulders. At this, she snapped back to reality and the murmur of conversation from the living room trickled into her ears. She took a deep breath. This really was a nice gesture from her friends, but she needed some processing time.

“No, I’d still like to meet them,” she replied, mustering something resembling enthusiasm from deep within, “would it be okay if I took ten minutes in my room to get my head on straight, though?”

“Of course!” Bow snapped to attention, flashing her a toothy grin, “Glimmer and I will keep them entertained while you go decompress.” Glimmer nodded earnestly and squeezed Adora’s hand which was still braced firmly on her shoulder.  
  
***  
  
Sitting, cross-legged on the floor of her room with her eyes closed, Adora breathed deeply, thinking hard about what her next move with Catra should be. Clearly, they’d gotten off to about the worst start imaginable at jazz night, which had been made decidedly more awkward by Glimmer’s well-meaning yet misguided attempt at social mediation. Their first interaction after seven years apart was instigated by Adora running away. That was a mistake. The only way to face their newfound proximity was head-on, and Adora needed to be the one to initiate it.

_Okay_. Adora exhaled a breath she didn’t realise she’d been holding. _It’s decided_.

She was going to take a few days to adjust to her new work and home life, and then she was going back to jazz night on Monday.

Comforted by the presence of a solid plan in her head, Adora decided that now was as good a time as any to re-join her friends out in the living room. Bow and Glimmer had distracted their guests, informing them that Adora had had a very long day and needed a moment to freshen up before meeting all of them, and she had waved without looking at any of them as she speed-walked down the corridor to her room.

After hesitantly opening her bedroom door, she slowly made her way back up the corridor towards the living room. Sitting in a circle, some on the couch and some on the floor, were Bow, Glimmer and their friends, all smiling up at her. Bow was on the couch in between a spaced-out looking blond girl with a flower crown that didn’t look the least bit ironic, and an aloof dark-skinned girl in jeans and a dark blue leather jacket – she wasn’t smiling but she did give Adora a nod, which she took as a mark of respect. Sitting in the beanbags on the floor was Glimmer and a guy that Adora immediately recognised. He had a quiff, a light blue waistcoat and an incredibly obnoxious waxed moustache. It was quite the hipster look, and it took all of three seconds before Adora identified him as the drummer from The Grotto.

_That’s right! One of Bow and Glimmer’s friends had a boyfriend in the band. This must be him._ Maybe he could get her in to see Catra in a way that was less likely to spook her.

“Hi everyone,” Adora announced herself, “sorry about that dramatic spectacle earlier, I don’t do well with surprises. I probably should have mentioned it to these guys before they went and planned a get together.” She smiled bashfully and rubbed the back of her neck as she waited for a response from the people gathered around her.

“Hey, no sweat,” said the dark-skinned girl, “it’s not like you set anything on fire.”

_Okay, seriously, what is it with these people and arson?_

“My dearest Mermista, I take personal offence at that remark.” The drummer spoke up, dramatically.

“Adora,” Bow piped up, “that’s Sea Hawk. He used to be our roommate.”

Glimmer was seething, “Honestly dude, I don’t know why we even let you back in here after the last fire you started.”

“I’d just been kicked out of the conservatoire, what else was I supposed to do?!”

“Literally, _anything_ else.”

Realising that this might be something of a sore subject, Adora decided to shift the conversation.

“You played in the house band at that jazz bar on Monday, right?” Adora ignored the looks of discomfort from Bow and Glimmer.

“Yes! That was a blast!”

“If you like that kind of thing,” the dark-skinned girl snorted, “I’m Mermista by the way. I’m in Glimmer’s lab group.”

“Lovely to meet you, Mermista,” Adora replied and took a seat on an unoccupied bean bag, “how’s our Glimmer as a lab partner?” Adora grinned as Glimmer huffed.

“Eh,” Mermista shrugged, “kinda annoying but competent at least.”

“Ooo, competent,” Bow piped up, “I think she actually likes you, Glim.”

Mermista only smirked as a response. Adora liked this girl’s vibe.

“And I’m Perfuma,” the spacey blonde stole her attention, “I study psychology.”

“More like astrology,” Mermista blurted, barely managing to catch the blonde’s attention, “honestly, ‘Fuma, when was the last time you put down your star charts and picked up a textbook?”

“I find the charts much more helpful,” Perfuma shrugged and took a long swig from a mug she was cupping with both hands, “oh, maybe Adora will let me give her a reading!”

Perfuma looked at Adora with big, hopeful eyes.

“Maybe some other time,” Adora smiled nervously. She didn’t put any stock in star signs, “but it’s nice of you to offer.”

The group continued talking for the next couple of hours, and Adora was really starting to like the trio of new faces, quirks and all. Mermista and Sea Hawk were an item (which was the only reason Glimmer had agreed to let him back in the flat), although Mermista didn’t seem too thrilled about it. Adora figured this was just part of her charm. Perfuma had convinced Bow to let her give him a reading and they had spent the better part of half an hour excitedly discussing planetary positions and star signs. Sea Hawk, as it turned out, was a keen collector of old sea shanties, which Adora might have found charming had he not periodically tried to burst into song before being violently interrupted by his girlfriend’s fists, much to everyone else’s amusement.

They’d been drinking, fairly casually, for the last hour or so, and at around 10pm, Adora went to grab another beer from the fridge as Glimmer went to turn the music up. Apparently, she wanted to dance, and only Sea Hawk seemed interested in joining her. As she pried the cap from her beer bottle, Bow sidled up beside her, refilling his wine glass.

“So,” he said, cautiously, “how’re you feeling, bestie?”

“A lot better, thanks,” Adora flashed him a genuine smile, “everyone’s really nice, and I think I’ve formulated a plan!”

“A plan?” Bow’s relieved smile turned to an expression of confusion.

“I’m gonna ask Sea Hawk to get me backstage to see Catra after her set on Monday night.”

“Are you sure that’s a good idea? Glimmer gave me the impression that she wanted to be left alone.”

“I’m not losing her again, Bow,” Adora tightened her grip around the beer bottle, “if she really wants nothing to do with me that’ll hurt, but I need her to know how much I want to be part of her life again.”

Bow was looking at her with tearful puppy eyes. _I really hope he doesn’t cry because I’m tipsy enough that I’ll end up joining in._ Thankfully, he managed to suppress the tears and opted instead for a bone-crushing hug.  
  
***  
  
The gathering came to a close just before midnight. Adora had really had a lovely evening, but she was definitely ready to call it a night. After exchanging phone numbers with their three guests Adora pulled Sea Hawk aside while Mermista and Perfuma were saying their goodbyes to her flatmates.

“Hey, I know we’ve just met, but could I ask you a massive favour?” Adora pleaded in hushed tones.

“Well of course,” Sea Hawk boomed, completely missing Adora’s attempt at discretion, “anything for a new friend!” Adora shook her head and chuckled despite herself.

“I’m an old… acquaintance of Catra’s,” friend seemed presumptuous at this point, “is there any way you could get me backstage to see her after your set, on Monday?”

“Hmm,” Sea Hawk began to dramatically stroke his moustache, “well, the problem is that I’m pretty sure Catra detests me,”

Adora had to violently supress a snort. Of course, Catra hates him.

“But,” Sea Hawk thrusted his forefinger into the air, “our bassist, Scorpia is her best friend and _she_ likes me. I bet if I introduced you to her, she could get you in to see Catra.”

“That would be amazing, Sea Hawk, thank you!” This wasn’t exactly what Adora had planned, but she could work with it. All she needed to do was convince this Scorpia woman that Catra would even be remotely interested in speaking to her… _Shit. That actually sounds kinda difficult._


End file.
